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After the Pyke Syndicate, there is clean-up to do. Given the nature of the syndicate’s business, Boba isn’t surprised to find their large ship’s brig filled with beings high on spice. He and Fennec walk by the cells with med-droid who advises who will have an easy recovery, who will have a difficult recovery, and who should be mercifully put down.
One of the syndicate leaders had a lightsaber stashed in his quarters. Boba thinks trophy collecting is gauche, but as a bounty hunter, he has presented more than one rich or cruel being with trophies for their collection. He didn’t think there were many lightsabers left in the galaxy. He pockets it and figures he’ll offer it to Din, the next time the Mandalorian stops by with his foundling.
They stop in front of a cell, and Boba doesn’t need the med-droid’s grim analysis to tell him this sentient doesn’t have many more days left in the galaxy. They are humanoid, and their white hair is matted, and their beard is unkempt, grown disordered without any care or maintenance. Their skin sags, perhaps from age, perhaps from lack of proper nutrition. Their hands shake, a spice addict and one deep in their addiction.
“Patient 3220 shows signs of a spice allergy,” the med-droid says. Boba appreciates that it says patient and not prisoner, but the designations, the numbers instead of names threaten to send him back decades into his memories. “Immediate treatment is required.”
Patient 3220 uncurls himself. His fingernails are bitten down and bleeding. His blue eyes are dim, and the whites of his eyes are more yellow than white, signs of sickness or maybe a symptom of his allergy.
He blinks, his attention on Boba, not the med-droid, despite the fact that Boba hasn’t spoken. In deference to enemy territory, Boba is in his armor, but his helmet is clipped to his belt until danger presents itself. The man squints and then shakes his head, as if he’s trying to see better.
“Cody?” the man asks and something in Boba’s chest goes cold and tight. “Cody, don’t miss this time. Please.” And then the man stretches out and gives Boba a clear shot at his head, his chest, wherever Boba prefers his kill shots to land.
Boba has been many things during his life. Favored son. Orphan. Criminal. Bounty hunter. Dead. Now, he is the daimyo of Tatooine. It is, perhaps the first thing he has truly chosen to be. Patient 3220, the Jedi, Kenobi, has also been many things throughout his life. Last Boba had heard of him, he was killed on the first Death Star by Darth Vader.
He’s curious what Kenobi will choose to be.
“Bring him to the palace,” Boba says.
#
The bacta tank is in use, and Boba still isn’t entirely certain he’s made the right choice by bringing Kenobi here, so he does what he thinks the Jedi would do. He leaves it up to the Force. He has a med-droid attend Kenobi, but whether Kenobi lives or dies is up to the mystical power Kenobi swore his life to. Fennec can tell that their new visitor disquiets him, but she doesn’t press. Boba wonders if she recognizes him. Boba wouldn’t have, not without the broken voice pleading for a clone who shared Boba’s face to end his life.
Fuck.
Boba has a complicated relationship with the other clones. He has a complicated relationship with his father. He has a complicated relationship with Cad Bane, who raised him, groomed him, betrayed him. Boba put Cad Bane down. He’s dead now, like Jango Fett, like most of the men who weren’t Boba’s brothers but might have been something.
Kenobi is complicated.
Boba could blame him for tracking Jango to Kamino and then following him to Geonosis, where Jango would ultimately die. Boba certainly blamed Windu and even took his chance at revenge when it was presented to him. But Boba could also blame Jango for taking a bounty on a prominent senator. He could blame the Trade Federation for invading Naboo and making Amidala such a powerful figure. He could blame the Jedi for Galidraan. Hell, he could blame Jaster Mereel for dying and leaving Jango alone.
Boba is old. He is bitter. But he isn’t consumed with revenge. He was reborn from the sarlacc, and the Tuskens taught him a new way. Boba wants to live.
And apparently, he’s extending a second chance to former enemies.
#
The next time Boba sees Kenobi, the man still looks like a stiff breeze would knock him over, but his eyes are alert, at least. They are clear and blue, sharp, despite the age lines framing them and the white eyebrows which sit above them. Another man old before his time, Boba thinks.
He is in simple pants and an even simpler shirt. It makes him look like a farmer, rather than one of the greatest generals of the Clone Wars. He braces himself as if he expects Boba to make that contrast clear.
And then, when Boba doesn’t make the first attack, Kenobi bows deeply. “Boba Fett, daimyo of Tatooine,” he greets.
“You know my name this time,” Boba says. He catches Kenobi’s flinch.
“Forgive me for earlier, I was not at my best.” Kenobi’s lips quirk in a smile that is almost familiar, but it fades quickly. He looks down at his feet, as if he knows the rancor is sleeping in its den below him. “Did you want me aware of who was delivering my death?”
Fennec snorts, and her rifle doesn’t waver, barrel pointed at Kenobi even though Boba told her there was no need.
“If you want to die, walk into the Dune Sea,” Boba says. “Let sun drain the life from your body and let the sand take what remains until you are only bones.”
“And if I don’t want to die?” Kenobi asks. He asks if he’s gathering information before making a decision.
Boba retrieves the lightsaber from where he had been storing it. He holds it out. “I have been told this is a Jedi’s life.”
A complicated series of emotions flash across Kenobi’s face, and Boba doesn’t try to decipher them all. There is a long moment, and Fennec no doubt curses Boba in her head, and then Kenobi steps forward and takes his lightsaber.
“Every court needs a magician, I suppose,” he says.
#
Kenobi stays. Boba isn’t sure why, and he isn’t sure what Kenobi intends to do, but he stays. He sleeps in the room he convalesced in, he eats at the meals Boba hosts in the dining room, and he lurks at the edges of the throne room while Boba conducts his business. Boba knows he’s being watched, being evaluated, but he isn’t sure to what end.
One morning, when they are sharing first meal, Kenobi says, “I have been remiss in my duties, I’m afraid,” and picks up three pink fruits. They’re round and have a protective peel. He tosses one into the air, then the second, then the third. He keeps them rotating and even adds another two.
“You’re juggling,” Fennec says. Despite the proof in front of her, she can’t quite believe it.
“Do you prefer card tricks?” Kenobi asks. He lifts an eyebrow to accentuate the question.
And there, Boba recognizes that spark. That is the spark of life, a man who has decided he will not let the sun and the sand have him.
“I like card tricks,” Yellow says. Yellow, is one of the four Mods who have made themselves at home in Boba’s palace. Their help against the syndicate was invaluable, and if they want to stop by for meals or to try and provoke Fennec into smiling, Boba won’t turn them away.
They still won’t give him their names, but they don’t mind it when he calls them by the color of their bikes. Yellow is male and he dresses like a professor, khaki pants with a sweater and a tie and a tan trench coat over the whole thing. It’s impractical for Tatooine, and it looks ridiculous, but he endures any and all mocking with a placid expression and refuses to change.
“Nerd,” Green mutters. Her long black hair has green stripes in it to remind everyone who she is even when she doesn’t have her bike.
“Would you like to learn?” Kenobi asks Yellow. Kenobi is still wearing the same loose pants and loose shirt he was first given. Boba wonders if he’d be partial to sweaters as well. He might need the help keeping himself warm as his body continues to recover from the strain of his spice dose.
“I’d rather learn sabacc tricks,” Blue says with a challenging tilt to her chin.
“I know both,” Kenobi says, and Boba’s reminded that he raised the Skywalker brat. He won’t be bothered by the Mods’ attitude. “I’m Ben Kenobi.”
It’s the first time he’s introduced himself. Boba’s glad to know what to call him. He doesn’t expect Yellow to gasp or for Blue to look even more interested in him.
“Ben Kenobi?” Blue repeats. She leans forward, eager. “The Wizard of the Wastes?”
“What?” Fennec asks flatly.
“Ah.” Kenobi scratches his beard, which is still white like bleached krayt dragon bones, but it is, at least, trimmed and well-kept now. “I suppose I do have a bit of a reputation.”
“Our house mother told us if we wandered into the desert at night, you would grab us and use our blood and our bones in your spells,” Yellow says.
“I don’t snatch children,” Kenobi says, but he says it to Boba, as if he thinks Boba would believe it. He understands the concern. Jedi do have a reputation for being child-stealers.
“And blood magic?” Fennec asks.
“No blood magic, either,” Kenobi answers. He tosses a pink fruit to each of the Mods and keeps one for himself. He uses a knife to break the skin, as if he doesn’t want to get the pink peel under his fingernails.
“Card tricks and juggling?” Blue asks. She sounds disappointed.
“A few other things,” Kenobi says, as if there aren’t holos of High General Obi-Wan Kenobi wrecking companies of droids with his lightsaber and the Force. “But a magician never reveals his secrets.”
“Except to an apprentice,” Fennec says.
Kenobi’s face goes pale under his beard. He sets his pink fruit on the table and then walks out. Boba is curious as he goes, even more curious when he sees the furrow of confusion between Fennec’s brow. Fennec is a sharpshooter, a sniper of nearly unmatched quality. When she aims, she almost always hits. But this wasn’t an intentional shot.
#
“I don’t know why I’m here,” Kenobi admits to Boba one night, when neither of them can sleep, and they both find themselves at the top of the guard tower where they can look out for miles.
Here as in Boba’s palace? Here as in alive? Boba supposes his response is the same. “Does it matter?”
Kenobi is startled by the question. “I—” his thoughts catch up to his mouth and he pauses. “I suppose it doesn’t.” He rubs his hands over his arms, even though he wears a thick cloak to protect against the evening chill. “I thought if I could find the reason, everything would make sense.”
For the Empire, Boba thinks. For the destruction. For the genocide of the Jedi. Maybe even for the betrayal of the clone troopers. Boba knows a thing or two about hunting for reasons. And he knows it doesn’t matter. Reasons don’t bring back the dead. Explanations don’t make it easier to sleep.
“The Force,” Boba says, offering what comfort he can. “Isn’t that your explanation for everything?”
Kenobi laughs and it’s a small, hurt sound. Too late, Boba realizes how he might have hurt him. If the Force guides the Jedi through everything, then the Force killed all of Kenobi’s brethren.
“They used to tell us, the Force wasn’t good or evil, it simply was,” Kenobi says softly. “But indifference…that might be the cruelest option of them all.”
Boba isn’t sure whether it was better to lose faith early, like Boba did when his father promised to come back and died instead or if it’s worse to lose it late, like Kenobi, who bows his head, a broken man. Boba was raised to believe the Jedi were the enemy, sorcerers who stole children and murdered Mandalorians and only pretended to care for others. He watched as the Clone Wars proved some of these stories true and others false. He watched the great Jedi Order fall to ruin and then he helped Vader clean up the stragglers.
He’s reminded in this moment that the Jedi were a religious order.
“I was prepared to die on the Death Star,” Kenobi says. “If I’m honest, I was prepared to die the day the Republic fell. When the ship I was on was captured, I knew those with me wouldn’t be able to escape without my help. And my sacrifice. It felt inevitable. It felt as though it was the end of something I had been waiting for for a very long time.”
“You didn’t die,” Boba says. Clearly not, but he feels as though it needs to be said. Explained.
“I didn’t. Vader knew. He knew I had come to die and when I raised by saber in surrender, he didn’t kill me. He wanted to, I think. But whatever kept me from killing him on Mustafar kept him from killing me on the Death Star.”
Boba hadn’t heard of a battle on Mustafar. He also hadn’t known that Vader had Kenobi, even though he did a fair amount of work for Vader between the two Death Star destructions. It was Vader, after all, who helped him finally capture Solo in exchange for Luke Skywalker.
“He sent me back to Tatooine,” Kenobi says. “He told me he’d come for me once he had the twins and they needed a teacher. He said if they turned out anything like my last apprentice, he would be proud. He died, of course. And I was drugged and kidnapped by the Pyke Syndicate so that never happened. And now I’m here. If this was the Force’s plan for me, it was a shitty one.”
Boba laughs. He could ask about Kenobi’s apprentice, Skywalker and—oh. He’d known about Anakin Skywalker and Padme Amidala, everyone did. There were several plans to use that relationship to bring down the Republic if needed, but he hadn’t known there were children. That brings up even more questions, but Boba won’t press. There is pain in Kenobi’s voice when he mentions his apprentice. There is grief, too, but it wasn’t grief that sent him from the table at Fennec’s comment. And it isn’t grief that causes him to dig his fingers into his wrists now.
He still doesn’t have long nails. Kenobi doesn’t bite them anymore, but he keeps them short, and it means he can’t score angry red lines into his skin. He aims for bruises instead, and Boba eases Kenobi’s grip.
It’s the first time they’ve touched, and Kenobi’s muscles bunch under Boba’s hand, tension, and indecision, and then Kenobi relaxes as if exhaling. He drops his hands to his sides.
“You didn’t have a particularly good time of it, either,” Kenobi says.
“No, but I don’t believe in the Force,” Boba says. “I was adrift, misguided, confused, whatever you want to say. But now, I am in control.”
“And you chose to be the daimyo of Tatooine,” Kenobi says.
“I was a bounty hunter for a very long time,” Boba says. “Longer than most. There is little loyalty, between hunters, from employers. I wanted something better.”
“A community,” Kenobi says. “And you are its leader.”
Boba had told Fennec his thoughts when he offered her a place with him. He wanted to be an employer who took care with his employees’ lives. He wanted to use his experience and his smarts. He sees the consideration on Kenobi’s face and how it melts into something like pride.
The expression rests uncomfortably against Boba’s scarred skin. He knows what he was meant for. Kenobi does as well. He was Jango Fett’s legacy, his son. But Boba knows enough of Mandalorian culture to know how Jango failed at being Mand’alor, on Galidraan and then again on Kamino. How was Jango supposed to pass on a legacy he didn’t have?
Boba is not Mand’alor. He is not even Mandalorian. Being daimyo of Tatooine isn’t a pale imitation of that destiny. It isn’t a longing for something he never even wanted. It’s something different. Bounty hunters, they’re his people. The citizens of Mos Eisley, they’re his people now too. He proved it when he fought for them against the syndicate.
This city is enough for him. He doesn’t need more.
“Fennec told me,” Kenobi says, as if he’s decided it’s safe to speak more. “You want to rule with respect, rather than fear.”
“The galaxy has had enough fear,” Boba says.
Boba was a clone, but he wasn’t a clone trooper. Jango Fett was his father. Boba was special, and he didn’t need to drill all day. He had his own room, part of Jango’s quarters instead of a bunk in the barracks. He was Jango Fett’s son and that was more important than being a trooper. And then his father died, and Boba was alone, even in a galaxy where millions of men had the same genetic code as him.
Boba doesn’t use Mando’a. He did because Jango encouraged it. But Buir died on Geonosis, and Boba systemically rejected all those lessons on culture and belonging. If he still spoke the language, maybe Fennec would be vod. Maybe, the Mods would be ade.
But he isn’t Mandalorian. He is the daimyo, which is clan but isn’t aliit.
Unlike most things in his life this isn’t complicated. Boba’s history, how it threatens to intrude on the present, that is complicated. But ruling Tatooine, protecting and expanding his territory, that is simple. That is his purpose.
He hopes Kenobi finds his.
#
Kenobi, Boba remembers, was sometimes called the Negotiator, to the point that his flagship was named after the nickname. He is a useful ally to have, and he settles more once he feels he’s contributing to his stay.
He doesn’t use his lightsaber, Boba’s hasn’t even seen the weapon since he handed it over, but Boba doesn’t need him to. Boba has plenty of muscle on his staff and, he knows, if the situation was dire, Kenobi would fight.
But what Kenobi can do that none of Boba’s other allies can do, is sweet talk people into doing what Boba wants. Kenobi doesn’t need his lightsaber to make people do what he wants. He talks until they are eager and volunteering.
A magician, indeed.
#
It has been quite some time since Boba has seen Din. He finds himself missing the Mandalorian. Fennec is the one to tell him there doesn’t need to be a crisis for the two of them to talk. No foundlings need to be kidnapped, no cities need to be threatened.
That shifts Din from ally to friend. Boba considers this shift and then comms Din to invite him to visit. Din has to finish a bounty and then he and his kid land their fancy starfighter in Boba’s hangar.
It doesn’t occur to Boba that this might be a problem until Grogu is waddling up to the throne, his beskar tunic glinting in the light of the room. Boba turns to Kenobi, who looks a little like he has been clubbed over the head with a gaderffii.
Grogu, of course, holds his clawed little hands out to Kenobi and coos, because the kid has never met anyone he can’t charm. Even Boba’s rancor was charmed by Grogu.
“Well,” Kenobi says after a long pause. Boba suspects they were doing some kind of Jedi communication. “I suppose I should teach you how to juggle.”
Grogu pulls a silver ball out of his pocket and holds it out.